“Sorry, Cary, you've got the wrong person. Your mom's last name is Fox, and right now she's still lying in your dad's bed.”
With that, I hung up on him.
Cary called back almost immediately.
“Mom, you really don't plan to take care of me anymore? If you don't look after me properly and my grades slip, don't blame me.”
The words pulled a cold laugh out of me.
For the sake of Cary and Denise doing well on their SATs, I had nearly worked myself to the bone caring for them.
I was up at five every morning to buy fresh ingredients, planning balanced meals, making sure they had nutritious breakfasts.
Then I drove them to school, and whenever their grades dipped, I hired tutors.
But instead of gratitude, they grew more and more distant from me, egged on by Zelda.
They said they needed freedom, that I treated them like machines built to grind through problems, that I crushed them until they couldn't breathe.
And Zelda? She played the role of the warm, understanding big sister, granting their every wish. That was what made them despise me so completely.
Well, I wanted to see whether they could keep those grades up this time, now that I wasn't looking after them.
I hung up on Cary again, and this time they didn't call back.
But curiosity got the better of me, and I logged into the home security cameras anyway.
What greeted me was a complete mess: the table buried under leftover food, much of it spilled onto the floor.
Sunflower seed shells and all kinds of trash were scattered everywhere.
Someone's clothes lay in a careless heap on the couch.
Cary and Denise were knocking on the door of Ervin's master bedroom.
They knocked for a long time before Ervin finally cracked the door open and passed out a hundred dollars, telling them to go buy their own breakfast.
More than an hour later, Ervin and Zelda finally emerged from the master bedroom.
“Zelda, tidy up the house a bit.”
After washing up, Zelda took one look at the wreckage filling the place and her brows knit together.
It was obvious she had no desire to lift a finger, but she gritted her teeth and cleaned anyway.
The moment Ervin saw she was unhappy, he hurried over with an ingratiating smile.
That kind of tenderness Ervin showed Zelda was something I'd never once tasted in nearly twenty years of marriage to him.
I really wanted to know how long a woman who had to be coddled like that could be kept happy.
A day later, Ervin transferred two million dollars to me and told me to go to the county records office the next day to finalize the divorce.
I agreed readily.
Early the next morning, I didn't get to the records office until nine, and from a distance I could already see the three of them—Ervin, Cary, and Denise—gathered around Zelda, saying something.
I walked straight over, and when Ervin spotted me, he quickly came striding toward me.
Since there were no property disputes, the divorce went through fast. In under half an hour, we'd traded our marriage certificate for divorce papers.
The instant we stepped out of the records office, Cary and Denise came pushing Zelda forward.
“Dad, you two go get your marriage license. Sis and I want to throw a little celebration for you and Aunt Zelda today.”
Denise jumped in too “Dad, I want a fancy dinner.”
Zelda stroked Cary's and Denise's heads, her face full of doting affection.
“All right, my treat today.”
They were reveling in their celebration, while I stood there like a stranger.
Cary shot me a glance from across the way.
“Mom, don't be angry, be the bigger person. You should congratulate my dad on finding his true love.”
I couldn't be bothered with them. Both by feeling and by law, they were no longer my family.
